$80 for Tampons? Bloody Hell

The day you finally buck up and try your first tampon is like a little piece of heaven for a girl. I could wax poetic about the day you bid the diaper-like pads adieu, and taste freedom, heaven, nirvana. In fact, I just did.

But let me get this out there. No tampon is worth $76. Not even the O.B. tampons, which mysteriously disappeared from shelves last month and equally mysteriously reappeared this week. And yet there they are on eBay at prices like $84.90 for "Unopened O.B. OB Tampons ULTRA Purple Tampon 40 x 2 Box" and $76 for "3 Boxes O.B. OB Tampons ULTRA Purple Tampon 40 - 120ttl."

Sure, anyone can slap a crazy price on an eBay auction. But people are bidding on these. At $80 for tampons!

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The tampon black market is alive and well! Or should that be red market? I credit Jezebel's Dodai Stewart, a blogger blessed (cursed?) with the super flow, for the warning that O.B. was being yanked late last year. A devotee of the little cotton sticks without an applicator, hers was the first report I read that the ultra absorbency line was being yanked off shelves. Then came the warning that O.B. was off the shelves. All O.B.

I thanked my lucky stars that a certain post-menopausal woman had just recently passed on her stash just as I was starting to cotton onto the advantage of going applicator free (hello, space saving in the purse and, hello, easy to hide in the hand for a run to the ladies). It was almost as freeing as the day I ended my diaper-like contraption wedged up the butt dependency in favor of the teenage dream.

Stewart, always on top of things, announced just this week that we're safe, O.B. is back and here to stay. So pass your clots in peace ladies, you're safe.

Unless, that is, you're an ultra absorbency fan. They're still gone, and they're never coming back (evil cackle courtesy of parent company JJ McNeil). Which has led us to scenes like this:

See those bids? It's a bloody mess -- pun intended. Because a run to Target last weekend confirmed I could get my old standby, the Tampax Pearl Compact (also a space saver in the purse, also easy to hide for that run to the bathroom) for about $6.50 a box. I'm willing to pay more than the store brand when it comes to something that goes inside my vag, but for something I use every month without fail, I have my limits. With that kind of mark-up, I just can't see being brand loyal.